The Bird Market

Anton Chekhov

THERE is a small square near the monastery of the Holy Birth which is called Trubnoy, or

simply Truboy; there is a market there on Sundays. Hundreds of sheepskins, wadded coats,

fur caps, and chimneypot hats swarm there, like crabs in a sieve. There is the sound of the

twitter of birds in all sorts of keys, recalling the spring. If the sun is shining, and there are

no clouds in the sky, the singing of the birds and the smell of hay make a more vivid

impression, and this reminder of spring sets one thinking and carries one's fancy far, far

away. Along one side of the square there stands a string of waggons. The waggons are

loaded, not with hay, not with cabbages, nor with beans, but with goldfinches, siskins,

whatever comes into it, a rouble, or three kopecks, according to the purchaser. There are

expensive birds too. A faded old blackbird, with most of its feathers plucked out of its tail,

sits on a dirty perch. He is dignified, grave, and motionless as a retired general. He has

waved his claw in resignation to his captivity long ago, and looks at the blue sky with

indifference. Probably, owing to this indifference, he is considered a sagacious bird. He is

not to be bought for less than forty kopecks. Schoolboys, workmen, young men in stylish

greatcoats, and bird-fanciers in incredibly shabby caps, in ragged trousers that are turned up

at the ankles, and look as though they had been gnawed by mice, crowd round the birds,

splashing through the mud. The young people and the workmen are sold hens for cocks,

young birds for old ones. . . . They know very little about birds. But there is no deceiving

Among the waggons of birds there are some full of other live creatures. Here you see hares,

rabbits, hedgehogs, guinea-pigs, polecats. A hare sits sorrowfully nibbling the straw. The

guinea-pigs shiver with cold, while the hedgehogs look out with curiosity from under their

prickles at the public.

"I have read somewhere," says a post-office official in a faded overcoat, looking lovingly at

the hare, and addressing no one in particular, "I have read that some learned man had a cat

and a mouse and a falcon and a sparrow, who all ate out of one bowl."

"That's very possible, sir. The cat must have been beaten, and the falcon, I dare say, had all

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its tail pulled out. There's no great cleverness in that, sir. A friend of mine had a cat who,

saving your presence, used to eat his cucumbers. He thrashed her with a big whip for a

fortnight, till he taught her not to. A hare can learn to light matches if you beat it. Does that

surprise you? It's very simple! It takes the match in its mouth and strikes it. An animal is

like a man. A man's made wiser by beating, and it's the same with a beast."

Men in long, full-skirted coats move backwards and forwards in the crowd with cocks and

drunken footman, is selling a snow-white lap-dog. The old lap-dog whines.

"She told me to sell the nasty thing," says the footman, with a contemptuous snigger. "She

is bankrupt in her old age, has nothing to eat, and here now is selling her dogs and cats. She

cries, and kisses them on their filthy snouts. And then she is so hard up that she sells them.

'Pon my soul, it is a fact! Buy it, gentlemen! The money is wanted for coffee."

But no one laughs. A boy who is standing by screws up one eye and looks at him gravely

with compassion.

The most interesting of all is the fish section. Some dozen peasants are sitting in a row.

Before each of them is a pail, and in each pail there is a veritable little hell. There, in the

thick, greenish water are swarms of little carp, eels, small fry, water-snails, frogs, and

can keep him for a year in a pail and he'll live! It's a week since I caught these very fish. I

caught them, sir, in Pererva, and have come from there on foot. The carp are two kopecks

each, the eels are three, and the minnows are ten kopecks the dozen, plague take them! Five

kopecks' worth of minnows, sir? Won't you take some worms?"

The seller thrusts his coarse rough fingers into the pail and pulls out of it a soft minnow, or

a little carp, the size of a nail. Fishing lines, hooks, and tackle are laid out near the pails,

and pond-worms glow with a crimson light in the sun.

An old fancier in a fur cap, iron-rimmed spectacles, and goloshes that look like two dread-

noughts, walks about by the waggons of birds and pails of fish. He is, as they call him here,

"a type." He hasn't a farthing to bless himself with, but in spite of that he haggles, gets

each one of them a good hour ago. He is as interested as a child in the goldfinches, the carp,

and the minnows. Talk to him, for instance, about thrushes, and the queer old fellow will

tell you things you could not find in any book. He will tell you them with enthusiasm, with

passion, and will scold you too for your ignorance. Of goldfinches and bullfinches he is

ready to talk endlessly, opening his eyes wide and gesticulating violently with his hands. He

the country, catching quails with a bird-call and angling for fish.

"Please, sir!" the pigeon-sellers shout to him, "Mr. Schoolmaster, your Scholarship, take

"Your Scholarship!" is shouted at him from every side.

"Your Scholarship!" an urchin repeats somewhere on the boulevard.

And his "Scholarship," apparently quite accustomed to his title, grave and severe, takes a

pigeon in both hands, and lifting it above his head, begins examining it, and as he does so

frowns and looks graver than ever, like a conspirator.

And Trubnoy Square, that little bit of Moscow where animals are so tenderly loved, and

where they are so tortured, lives its little life, grows noisy and excited, and the business-like

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